United colours of India

The elegant leaflet we all got at the memorial service of hotelier and aesthete Francis Wacziarg last Sunday had a photograph of him in an all-white ensemble of Kerala dhoti and short-sleeved kurta. It made me wonder whether it was because Francis was an Indian by choice rather than by birth, that he accepted all things desi with such unparochial pride. Perhaps ‘born’ Indians – particularly the ‘cosmopolitans’ – shy away from “ethnicwear” precisely to avoid that tag. They leave that to arty-farty jholawalas and of course, eager-beaver foreigners.

Sonia Gandhi only wears sarees and salwar suits because she’s “really” Italian say her detractors. Always attired flamboyantly in desi clothes, William Dalrymple has become a ‘white nabob’ character out of one of his own books. And Faith Singh is a walking ad for her Anokhi brand. It’s so easy to knock them. But what of the scores of other foreigners domiciled in India from apple evangelist Samuel (Satyanand) Stokes a century ago to ‘snakeman’ Romulus Whitaker, architect Rosemary Sachdev and interior designer Bronwyn Latif who are so at ease in Indian textiles?

Clothes may seem a superficial allegory when plumbing the human psyche, but living as we do in a land of diverse languages, clothes, cuisines and arts, they do serve as a pointer to who we are. They place us in categories not merely in terms of geography but also psychology and sociology. What motivates us and determines our self-image is usually reflected in our lifestyle choices – in relationships, food and drink, music and more. But the desire to rise above Tagorean ‘narrow domestic walls’ makes too many of us Indians abjure our legacies altogether.

The guilt complex inherent in such reactions is manifest. Does wearing a mundu in the Capital make a Malayali less modern or wholly Indian? Does – or should – a dhoti typecast a man as a Hindi heartland chauvinist? Do young women in sarees or salwar-kameezes deserve to be hooted as ‘behenjis’, or worse still, ‘aunties’? Indeed, if the universal uniform of jeans/trousers, shirts and jackets guarantee or bespeak modernity, then the men who set upon Nirbhaya and her friend in a bus are poor ambassadors for ‘liberal’ westernization.

Since it is election season, we are being bombarded with images of netas in what many derisively call ‘fancy dress’. In the last few days, Narendra Modi donned a saffron Sikh turban in Jagraon in Punjab and a hornbill headdress in Pasighat in Arunachal Pradesh. And Rahul Gandhi has appeared in an Assamese jaapi and gamchha in Guwahati. Even Arvind Kejriwal doffed his aam aadmi topi and seasonal muffler for a kesariya headcovering and scarf when visiting a gurudwara in Delhi. Their idea, obviously, is to connect with their target audience.

But should cynicism invariably coat regionspecific sartorial adoptions by even us nonneta Indians? Why can’t a Bengali woman wear a beautiful Coorg mangalsutra? Should a Tamil bhodromohila in a red bordered Tangail saree be instantly smirk-worthy? Why shouldn’t a Marathi mulgi wear a minimalist Khasi jainsem or a bold Mizo puanchei? Or a Naga woman drape a phulkari dupatta? As for the men, should they never venture to wear anything other than the kurta-pyjama, sherwani-churidar and stitcheddhoti-kurta-angavastram triumvirate?

Being a foreigner in India – or even better, a naturalized Indian-by-choice like Francis – clearly is a liberating factor. Francis was free to love India and anything Indian in any way he wanted, as he belonged to all of India rather than a specific part. And he reveled in it. From pioneering Franco-Indian opera and furthering the cause of music via the Neemrana Foundation to opening innumerable hotels-with-a-story in amazing littleknown corners of India, making friends along the way, Francis lived India’s unity in diversity philosophy.

Indians are happily adopting western wear, right down to shorts and micro-minis in keeping with their globalising ambitions, and well they should. But even as we embrace the world, why can we not rise above parochialism internally and open up to the vastness of our own Indian repertoire as well — in food and drink, in music and dance, in clothes and jewellery? Some Indian fashion designers – especially from the north-east like Sonam Dubal – are doing their best to unite the threads of India. But like Francis we also need to become Indians by choice.